Critical Thinking in 21st Century America Essay

The intellectual roots of critical echoing date back to the teachings of Socrates, who sight a method of analytical questioning known today as Socratic questioning, establishing that one could non rationally justify their assured claims to knowledge. Socrates established that people can non depend upon those in authority to retain serious knowledge and insight. He demonstrated that individuals may have power and high position and yet be deeply conf physical exercised and irrational.He established the importance of asking questions and thinking deeply before we involve an mood as worthy of precept. Socrates stressed the significance of seeking evidence, closely examining reasoning and assumptions, analyzing basic concepts, and canvas out implications non only of what is said but of what is done. This, I believe, is essential to living a prospering and knowledgeable spiritedness question every social function and everyone.I strongly agree with Socrates idea that we cannot d epend upon an individual of high power to have all-encompassing knowledge and insight solely based on their status. The use of accepted words, in just the right way, is enough to make some individuals believe just around anything close successful lawyers have built their entire careers simply by knowing what to say, how to say it, and when to say it. Although I feel that critical thinking is a necessity without life, along with analyzing and questioning everything I also feel that it is not something that is simply learned.Today, in our contemporary 21st century American society, we are sure enough allowed to be and/or trained to be critical thinkers, but it is only certain individuals who will use critical thought to its highest aptitude to expand their knowledge and kick in up the mind. These individuals, some sequences rare, have the ability to reflectively question common beliefs and justifications, and use this to carefully distinguish those beliefs that are reasonable and logical from those which pauperisation acceptable evidence or rational foundation to justify a certain belief.Socrates practice was followed by many great critical thinkers, such as Plato, Aristotle, and the Greek skeptics, all of whom emphasized that things are very much very different from what they appear to be and that only the trained mind is prepared to see through the way things look to us on the surface, misleading appearances, to the way they really are beneath the surface, the deeper realities of life. scathing thinking, amongst many other definitions, is the ability to understand and apply, to infer and to meaningfully investigate given information the aptitudes unavoidable to see equivalents, comprehend connections, identify problems, and develop justifiable explanations. It identifies bias, and a bias is not needs liberal it is simply a preferred way of looking at things. However, critical thinking does not necessarily benefit everyone it can alter relations hips, change attitudes, and cause family and friends to part ways.In light of our readings, many of the individuals we have discussed stress the need for a critical society, but additionally stress that it is not always beneficial, peculiarly for those susceptible to nonsense. John Stuart Mill feared conformism among society as a whole, he saw this as a uniformity which enforced narrow-minded views and illogical rules on those individuals more overspread-minded and educated.A fewer years back while researching religion for a paper, I came across Mills idea of hell belief, where he argues that the belief in hell is made inconsistently both strong and watery by a total system failure in critical thinking that hell belief is incompatible with the belief that God is good. He explains that the same mind set that enables them to accept a opening involving these contradictions prevents them from seeing the logical consequences of the theory. Mills ideas of hell belief are very similar to those of my own.Many, if not most, people are introduced and expected to abide by a certain religion by the time they speak their first words. Naturally, more often than not, religion and religious values are the first thing that many are taught however religion allows little, or no room, for critical thinking. Many people contribute their religious beliefs and values throughout life, where critical thinkers challenge and question it they find the stuff that doesnt preferably make sense and demand to know where the logic lies and why exactly theyre supposed to life by these ideas.In Mills ideas, people come to believe in it and manage to persist sane about it for the same reason, a lack of critical thinking. In our readings, we see that Bertrand Russell emphasizes the importance of open and free analysis, and the critical need to create education systems that raise open-minded pursuit of knowledge and cautions the dangers intrinsic in rigid ideologies.I agree with Russell an d believe that children should be taught to think critically as in brief as they start their education because as adults it is almost impossible to learn, it is not simply a skill you can up and decide you want to possess.If more schools implemented a system that encourages children to keep an open mind and consistently put certain ideas and theories to the test, they would be better prepared for future education, encouraged to socialize with their peers even if theyre not from the same religious or ethnic background, and overall be healthful prepared for life itself the habit of questioning everything leads to the development of well-rounded knowledge.When referencing the answers that many of us strive for, Russell explains that if philosophical system cannot answer all of our questions, it at least holds the power of asking questions which increase the interest of the world, and show the unfamiliarity and phenomenon lying just below the surface even in the simplest things of ev eryday life. He identifies a need for a theory of knowledge that will merge what appears to be from what really is, as well as the importance to practice knowledge responsibly.Russell explains to us that in order to make statements or hold beliefs about knowledge, we must be able to substantiate that our knowledge is accurate to reality. Although uncertainty and doubt are Descartes enemy, he wanted to use doubt as a tool or weapon to combat uncertainty. What, if anything, could not be doubted after subjecting all of his knowledge to the acid wash of doubt. The one thing that Descartes concluded could not be doubted was that he was doubting. There has to be an I who is thinking. Descartes famous dictum, Cogito Ergo Sum, means I think therefore I am.